Prologue:

Almost Drowning Isn’t Fun, So I Decided To Swim.

           So… there I stood – thirty-one years of age, standing waist-deep in a dark, cold, endless ocean of my thoughts. At that point in my life, there was nothing more than twenty-foot high tide-waves of despondency, gloom, and hopelessness that began to flood the inner walls of my cranium! As I came to the realization of how stagnant I had been in life, I asked myself How did I get here? and by here, I mean absolutely nowhere. Before deciding to change the way that I viewed the remainder of my days above ground, I accepted the harsh truth that I had merely been existing rather than living. All blame was to be directed towards me, versus circumstance. Conversely, I knew that there had to be more than just going through life aimlessly, hoping that some miraculous event would occur and alter my physical and mental state of being. 

             So, I chose to take control of the most precious resource that life had gifted me with – Time. I realized that time was an invaluable resource, but is also extremely limited and had been unforgiving towards me, being that I chose to waste it by not utilizing it effectively. Once taken ownership of, however, time permitted me to really learn myself on a level of intimacy that no other force or being on earth had ever done before. As a byproduct of being more aware of every minute that passed me by, along with searching within myself to find the man that I had the potential to be one day; The epiphany and internal revelation of who I was, had been revealed. The authority that I had become conscious of, empowered me to change my life and I began to do just that.

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             I ceased my voluntary act of dead-man floating, pushed off of the rocky ocean floor inside of my head, by the force of my tipped-toes and started swimming. By choosing to swim through the fears of my potential failures, I realized that I had just declared war between two spheres of my mind, that operated on two completely opposite ends of the success spectrum. The war was between my Conscious Mind – i.e. My rationale driven, critical thinking system and my Subconscious Mind– i.e. My emotion driven, true belief system. 

             Getting back to the moment in which I chose to start swimming, I realized that my thoughts of potentially drowning from the fear of failing in life was still an undeniable reality, but I told myself to keep kicking, even though my back began to tighten from the breast stroke technique. Gasping for air and only intaking anxiety, as it filled my throat with the familiar salinity of ocean water; Thoughts of not being able to breathe circulated throughout my conscious mind. But then, I inhaled. I felt the air from above the ocean sky coursing through my lungs, as my subconscious mind believed that I could succeed. Remembering that I chose to swim and not sink, empowered me to push forward and my assurance in knowing that I would be prosperous surpassed any terror that I had related to failure. Still swimming, feeling encouraged and still a little desperate at the same time, the waves of depair presumed to rise beyond my neck with no yield. My arms began to tire. Fatigue was starting to set in, but I consciously said to myself – I refuse to drown. I repeated it over and over again, as I felt the waters rise above my chin – I refuse to drown. Believing this credence subconsciously, even more so than before, I took a deep breath right before the water rose above my lips and I screamed to the top of my lungs – I REFUSE TO DROWN!!!

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             We all have untapped potential hidden within us that fuels us to persevere through our difficulties and become the purpose driven individual that we were born to be. Most people either believe this truth wholeheartedly or they don’t believe it at all. Sadly, Like the old me, those who don’t believe the utterance, most likely have been conditioned to think in finite terms. This book will help reveal to yourself – the infinite you. The practical, more importantly, applicable keys within this book, will provide you with the same principles, laws, and disciplines that helped me unlock and operate my life from my subconscious mind; Through affirming mental impressions that helped me create the physical and mental success that I’m currently living. This is not a step-by-step user guide on how to become successful by the way. Conversely, the invaluable tools and advice presented within the four chapters of this reading are more suggestive recommendation based, rather than forceful or demanding. The reading is outlined this way, because mankind hates being told what they should and shouldn’t do. Especially when it comes to choices that dictate the well-being or detriment to their livelihood.

             I’m no psychologist, biologist, neuroscientist or any other form of M.D. I’m simply a man who was eager to learn more about myself as a person. Who I could become as a potential influencer in this beautiful world that I live in. Most importantly, a man who yearned to learn why I think the way that I do. In other words, a regular down-to-earth person who wants to make the most of life and enjoy the abundance that life has to offer. 

Just like you.

Chapter One: 

Wake Up To The New You

**** Embrace Your Rebirth

“In the scheme of life, hitting the snooze button is not that big of a deal, but here’s the thing about life;.None of us wake up and say, today is the day that I destroy my life.” 
Mel Robbins – Author/ Motivational Speaker

             Like Robbins, we all tend to hit the snooze button of life, because we’re too unaware or indirectly taught to believe that we can’t become more than who we are currently. This finite way of thinking compels us to fear what we don’t know and stay inside of the bubble of conformity that increases in size and destroys us over time. This amalgamation of conformity creates habitual complacencies that impair our ability to look deep inside of our subconscious mind, and on demand, tap into the endless sea of potential that’s fostered deep within us. I know this asphyxiated feeling of false contentment extremely well, being that I use to consciously deceive myself into believing that I had actually accomplished things in life that were worth me hanging my hat on. Sadly, that was not the case and being this honest and critical with myself was a gut-wrenching awakening. Realizing and admitting that I had been wasting my days away, simply because I didn’t have the healthy disciplines in place, needed to change the unwanted life results that, at the time, defined me. 

             I, like countless others, ceased to take ownership of my life’s shortcomings and disappointments by standing on the notion that I could play victim. I did so by blaming society, the government, family curses and the lack of guidance given from credible people, when I was younger. People who could provide insight on how to control life and help me better understand how to kill the clichés’, false dogmas, and racial stereotypes. In other words, all the cancerous thoughts that had molded me into the fruitless being that I once believed and accepted myself to be. All-in-All, I stopped blaming external forces and came to the decision that everything that did or didn’t happen to me was my fault and it was time for me to wake up! Arise on my own, without an alarm clock and stop hitting the snooze button of life.

I did just that.

**** Create Your Morning Ritual

“For the past thirty-three years, I’ve looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself, if today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I’m about to do today; and when the answer has been no for too many days in a row; I know I need to change something.”
Apple CEO Steve Jobs– Apple CEO.

             The two-thousand five Stanford commencement speech that Jobs gave, was and still is one of the most powerful sermons that I’ve ever heard in my life. Despite all of the advice and best practices shared from Jobs to the graduating class throughout his time on stage, there was one talking point in particular that stood out to me. That talking point was his self-discipline, even though he highly underemphasized its’ importance, as he verbalized his message.

             The synopsis of what Jobs expressed, as he poured into the next generation of leaders, is that no matter what you do or don’t do in life – you’re going to die one day. So, why not do something meaningful and make the most out of your life while you have the chance to do so. This was great advice and his mentioning of death put things into perspective for a number of graduates, but it also sparked an awareness in myself that I couldn’t deny, because death is a hell of a motivator.

             As I redirect your attention back to the highlighted talking point that will forever be ingrained in my memory, learning that he had the self-discipline to adhere to his morning routine was very impressive. Given how busy I assumed he was. 

             Hearing and digesting his self-regulations on how he stayed committed to hisparticular ritual for thirty-three plus years was mind blowing. This was a man who was occupied with many different responsibilities, that I’m sure required his undivided attention, but no matter how successful he became, he remained entrenched to the morning ritual that worked for him. 

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             How intentional you are, in starting your day with a positive state of mind will either kill you or give you life. Later in this book, I’ll get into the specifics of why that notion is unfortunately truer than what most people would subconsciously believe. Think about it; Why is it that some individuals dread getting out of bed in the morning and others can’t wait to get up and start their day? What is the underlying cause that dictates ones’ perspective to be proactive when he or she awakens, versus being reactive to whatever potentialities lie ahead, once our front door opens. Good or bad. Feeling puzzled? Don’t think about it too hard, because the answer is quite simple. IT’S YOUR SUBCONSCIOUS MIND, of course! 

             Developing a simple new habit, such as creating and infusing a new ritual in your traditional morning routine can vastly alter how the remainder of your day goes. This pivot in thought and dismantling of your old mental muscle-memory will be very unfamiliar at first, so look forward to a few quarreling thoughts such as I can’t do this,this is stupid, orit will never work. Mentally, putting this new discipline in to motion may feel counterintuitive, because your conscious mind is trained to redirect you away from anything that isn’t familiar, safe, or appeasing to your immediate consciousness.. The renewing of your conscious mind, however, is exactly what you need to practice, in order to break old habits that don’t benefit you, as you aspire to feed your subconscious mind with blossoming thoughts of triumph and goal attainment. 

**** My Morning Routine : My Morning Ritual

“Like many others who bathe and soak in their complacencies, my fear of the unfamiliar always took precedent over any motivation that I tried to exercise upon command, but again, something continued to feel different. I no longer let fear paralyze my mental persistency to step outside of my comfort-zone.”

             GIRLS! WAKE UP!! WE’RE GOING TO BE LATE!! This was the usual beginning of my old morning routine, sad to say. Yelling at my two young daughters, Ryleigh and Ryann, as if it was their fault that I wasn’t waking up on time every morning. God knows that I never purposefully wanted my girls to feel responsible for my inability to awaken and even though I wasn’t directly screaming at them, more so just out of frustration, their perception in the mist of me screaming at them, was their reality. They saw it as though, they were the reason we were all so sluggish when it was time for us to start our day. This led to my oldest daughter, Ryleigh, coming to me one morning and saying Daddy, why are you so frustrated? Are you not sleeping enough and that’s what’s making us rush in the morning? Immediately, I went numbed. Hearing her little voice, evaluating her perspective on the matter and playing that statement over in my mind, sadden my heart. I honestly felt like the world’s worst father, even though I knew that they loved me and forgave me for my outbursts. 

             Becoming extremely conscious of how Ryleigh perceived my frustrations of not getting to bed at a reasonable hour, encouraged me to take ownership of how I managed my time at nights, prior to their bedtime.

             As you may or may not have noticed, you don’t really hear me saying much about what Ryann, my two-year-old at the time, had to say about my impulsive morning tantrums. Ryann would simply wake up, sit ninety-degrees in her bed, while rubbing her little eyes with her left hand, right thumb in her mouth and say to me Daddy, I’m still tired. No-No, stop yelling.I would just look at her and smile, because she had always put me in my place when no one else ever could. 

             The next day, once I had gotten off of work, picked my girls up from school and put them to bed; I sat in the middle of my living-room floor. I relaxed my entire body, put my phone on silent, closed my eyes, took deep breaths and went into a fathomless meditative state. I sat in complete silence. Deafening silence, as a matter of fact. I was able to relinquish control of all the conscious thoughts that began to flow through me, relative to not being a great parent and consciously making decisions that bettered my children’s livelihoods. 

             Minutes passed as I was still sitting, which at that time felt like hours and while I sat indulging in an infinite state of solace, something began to speak to my subconscious mind, as I consciously repeated it to myself. That something was the speculative voice of my Amygdala. What is the Amygdala you ask? Allow me to play neuroscientist for a brief moment and explain. The Amygdala is an almond shaped mass of grey matter inside your brain, that plays a significant role in controlling parts of the memory that target the emotions of fear and anxiety. This was the same fear and anxiety felt when I was broadening my horizons to explore new ideas and foreign endeavors. 

             Although I wasn’t pleased with the returns that had been deposited back into my life’s bank account, due to my investment of bad decisions and wasted time, I was content. Content, because felt that I was in control of my normality, versus being in control of things that I didn’t have a great understanding of. Things like how to overcome self-doubt and breaking unhealthy habits that were instilled in me at a young age. 

             Like many others who bathe and soak in their complacencies, my fear of the unfamiliar always took precedent over any motivation that I tried to exercise upon command, but again, something continued to feel different. I no longer let fear paralyze my mental persistency to step outside of my comfort-zone. I was tired of the mundane and I was determined to be radically open-minded by trying something different. Something so unfamiliar to my conscious mind that it would allow me to systematically program my subconscious mind to work for me, rather than against me.

             As I sat in the middle of my living-room floor with my iPhone on the right-hand side of my hip, I allowed my conscious mind to foist over my subconscious mind and I began to think about many plausible eventualities of failure. Impenitently, my subconscious mind made known its’ authority, even though it is one-hundred percent recessive to what the conscious mind impresses upon it. Every time my conscious mind would think of the worst-case scenario related to whatever I was thinking about at the time, my inner emotional outburst, told my conscious mind to repeat this mantra; Many times out loud. Wake up in the morning and believe that you’re going to be in a positive mood, no matter what!I proceeded to do just that and repeated the mantra over and over. 

             Versus me listening to my objective thoughts and constructing a wall of resistance that segregated me from the mindset to trounce and invalidate my doubts and false beliefs – I created a plan. 

             That plan was the beginning of my morning routine and it started with a beautifully composed masterpiece, created by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart – titled Piano Concerto No. 23 in A Major: II. Adagio. I chose this song specifically, because throughout my life as I battled depression, it was one of the only numbers that always helped me get through my tough times. This piece verbalized no words, but the elation I felt when listening to the piano being played so wonderfully, spoke volumes like no other. I was determined to find a way to incorporate this song into my daily living, being that it calmed and inspired me so deeply. Then it hit me. I thought, why force a way to implement this melody at some point in time throughout my day? I could just exert it into the starting moments of the morning routine that I decided to create. 

             My conscious mind went to work, but it was my subconscious mind that would actually benefit from the choice to put this commitment in motion. I grabbed my iPhone, set Mozart’s classic as my morning alarm clock theme and labeled the alarm with this positive description – Your dreams are slowly becoming your reality. It’s a marathon, not a sprint. Be patient. That memo created the emotionalized belief of reassurance that would carry me through the day, regardless of what occurrences or developments awaited me. Truly believing this incantation, I got up from the floor, laid myself to bed and fell asleep.

             That next morning, as my alarm went off, I immediately thought to myself I’m going to call out of work today. Then something happened. Somehow, in the mist of my distrait, I recalled the commitment that I made from the night before. The recollection of how my subconscious mind had been impressed upon by my conscious mind, to wake up in the morning and believe that I’m going to be in a positive mood, no matter what, had arisen. This resurgence of information was the seemingly effortless act of my hippocampus. This is the area of the brain that plays a significant role in amassing daily memories from the short-term to the long-term.

             What came next into my conscious awareness, was the remembrance of how I would hear the therapeutic sounds of Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 23 playing. Hearing this did exactly what I knew it would do; It put me in a state of mind that empowered me to undergo happiness and this furnished an overwhelming sense of peace throughout my mental. The music also brought warmth and light to my cold dark room, which was something very new and liberating, compared to my normalcy.

             Now that my mind was alert and more jovial than it had ever felt before, I noticed that my body didn’t get the Mozart memo. Its’ customary feelings of fatigue and sleeplessness remained. I reached over, grabbed my iPhone and was surely about to press the snooze button, but I paused and refrained from doing so.  Subconsciously, Mel Robbins came to mind and I smiled. I realized that I had almost defaulted to my lazy and barren ways. This is what often happens when the habit-making systems of my brain called the basil ganglia tried to work against me, versus with me. This grouped system of subcortical nuclei is associated with routine behaviors. Immediately I realized that I had to build new customs, by continuing to train my subconscious mind through positive repetitive impressions, that derived from my conscious mind. Impressions that ultimately made my conscious mind act in my favor without second guessing or question, even if the conscious act was alien to my normality.

             Rejoicing on the inside, I noticed that I had just beaten my urge to further my procrastination. I had gotten inspired, but my true inspiration came shortly after, when something caught my eye. That something was a simplistic reminder that displayed across my iPhone screen and read Your dreams are slowly becoming your reality. It’s a marathon – not a sprint. Be patient.

             Consciously, I knew this mantra was true. Subconsciously, I believed that this mantra was true and that’s how I knew that I was headed in the right direction towards becoming the best version of myself.

• Update #4 - 8/28/2019 - Update Aug. 6, 2019

  BOOKS ARE HERE!!!!!!!!!!! After a very intense back and forth with Amazon, I finally got your books =)

  I waited 3-weeks for my order and it …

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• Update #3 - Update - 7/29/2019 July 29, 2019

  Hello everyone!!! I just wanted to touch base with you all to see how you were--first and foremost. Secondly, I wanted to give you guys …

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• Update #2 - THANK YOU! May 31, 2019

  Hello everyone! I just wanted to let you know that I'm eternally grateful for the love and support that you all have shown me over …

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• Update #1 - Thank you everyone, for your attention to my book =) May 10, 2019

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